Useless tools

I've just finished reading Bob Johnston's interview in Number 80 issue of Tape Op and had a great laugh. What a great guy !!! Apart from being funny and the producer he is, he speaks exclusively of what is the driving force behind what we do, music.

And a couple minutes afterwards I received an email from Waves advertising their new plugin "The King's Microphones"...http://www.waves.com

Sh*t, what kind of completely stupid era are we in ??? How many completely useless tools are we proposed with ???

Read the Bob Johnston interview if you can, it's time better spent and it makes you want to record something fun immediately.

A couple of quick links:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-RxC_agoM-E&feature=related
http://www.mixonline.com/recording/interviews/audio_bob_johnston/


Piotr.

For some reason the link to the waves site doesn't work for me. Which useless tool are you talking about?

http://www.waves.com/content.aspx?id=11673

probably this one

that waves stuff is priceless. I so have to have it. I'll use it on everything... ;D

Piotr said:

Sh*t, what kind of completely stupid era are we in ??? How many completely useless tools are we proposed with ???
Piotr.

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People don't need anything special to create something with a musical instrument, or record something with a few decent items. The only reason all this crap is out there, is to offer someone a false sense of security...until the next thing comes along...then they need THAT.

eGO. It drives our economy.

D.

Piotr said:

And a couple minutes afterwards I received an email from Waves advertising their new plugin (http://www.waves.com/content.aspx?id=1167).

Sh*t, what kind of completely stupid era are we in ??? How many completely useless tools are we proposed with ???

Piotr.

Click to expand...

You beat me to that! I saw it this morning, and I thought: plug-ins are now in the age of maturity, you know, one of the cycles of technology, discovery, experimentation, utility and now the final stage where it becomes silly.

Well the cycle is ending silly that's for sure, but with fancy graphics.

The proposal of security (call it total recall, bit integrity, whatever...) is indeed an sign that we've entered a world in which the need of control overtakes many other aspects of creation. Compare an analog desk workflow to a DAW workflow. You've got to be really good not to drown in the amount of information you've got to process with a DAW, track count, visual representations etc... and that's not easy to learn. But this is going to change.

What doesn't change, is the fact that you're creating something with someone.

A lot of records tend to drift away from mistakes. "We" try to make them flawless because in some way we can. We are surrounded by music that has very little to do with life, while the records we cherish are full of life and mistakes. Not that I don't like Pro Tools, but I fight with how it changes the person I am. This is after all a fairly recent way of recording sounds.

Analog processing on the other hand, using your fingers and being attracted by a knob is instinctive by nature, as is live sound.
An analog desk or processor is always incorrect and imprecise compared to the mathematical "correctness" of a software. And in the end, that's what makes it normal and easier to use. It's a little like us.

Let's create tools that are fun to use, and let's create music !!!

Piotr said:

using your fingers and being attracted by a knob is instinctive by nature

Click to expand...

Haha! Interesting choice of words... Nearly wet myself...

If the sexual metaphor made you laugh, then it's a good way to start the day.

The dumbest buy the mostest; that's the name of the game.

kato said:

The dumbest buy the mostest; that's the name of the game.

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Oh yes The Geek thing, in France we say "useless but essential" haha...

zayance said:

kato said:

The dumbest buy the mostest; that's the name of the game.

Click to expand...

Oh yes The Geek thing, in France we say "useless but essential" haha...

Click to expand...

I like the phrase "useless but essential!"
Although, I wouldn't use it to describe this plug-in.

That's how I would describe my cat: "useless but essential." I'll learn to say it in French. Google says: "inutile mais indispensable?"

Also, how can you have a plug-in for a microphone??

Assuming your source has already been captured through a microphone. Then you run it through another virtual microphone? That's impossible. :-\

I'm guessing it's just and eq/modeler of the frequency response of the mics. So depending on what you use to actually record your audio, it could sound like anything but the mics they were modeling....seems incredibly useless.

What a brilliant Idea. I'll take impulse responses of all our mics, sell them, and the record everything with some cheap dynamic mics from the hifi store (the have a SM58 lookalike for 10€...) Then I only need to convince my clients that this is the genuine U87 sound.

Well, you would be only 11 years late...
http://www.antarestech.com/products/mic_mod_efx.shtml
http://www.roland.com/products/en/MMP-2/

Damn. Okay then, I'll make a speaker modelling plugin, makes your notebook's built-in speakers sound like a huge studio monitoring system. Yes, it really does. Honest.

You'll dance to anything
by the Smiths.

spreemusik said:

Damn. Okay then, I'll make a speaker modelling plugin, makes your notebook's built-in speakers sound like a huge studio monitoring system. Yes, it really does. Honest.

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Several speaker manufacturers are already doing this also.

Don't trust pluggins with 3D looking UI's...